A strange new possibility has turned up in the case of the missing airliner. Reports are coming out of Maldives that residents there saw a large airliner fly low a few hours after MH370 disappeared.

3.52 Reports from a Maldives news organisation that islanders saw a “low flying jumbo jet”. The Haveeru news website reports witnesses saw a plane flying low at around 6.15am on March 8. It was apparently flying north to south-east. A witness told the news organisation

I’ve never seen a jet flying so low over our island before. We’ve seen seaplanes, but I’m sure that this was not one of those. I could even make out the doors on the plane clearly.

It’s not just me either, several other residents have reported seeing the exact same thing. Some people got out of their houses to see what was causing the tremendous noise too.

We are not discounting the possibility that the plane landed on a runway that might not be heavily monitored, in addition to the theories that the plane landed on sea, in the hills, or in an open space.

So the pilot had a Maldives runway among his Indian Ocean practice spots? Might mean something, might mean nothing. But I think we can rule India, Diego Garcia and Sri Lanka out. Diego Garcia is home to a key US Navy base. If the plane went there, it would never have disappeared. Sri Lanka is a fairly large landmass right off the coast of India. If the plane went there, it would not have disappeared. Ditto for India.

But Maldives, which is an independent country, is a small string of tropical coral atolls out in the middle of nowhere. I went there on a vacation back in the 1990s — it’s an odd little place, stunningly beautiful, timeless and fairly backward and disconnected from the rest of the world, at least back then. It’s a mostly Muslim country that has gone off into a somewhat Islamist direction over the past decade or so. Maldives is a good 500 miles or so off India’s coast.

Once you land in the capital city, you have to take a boat ride to get anywhere. Our boat ride took, if I remember correctly, about three hours to get out to the resort-island we stayed at. The island was the resort, and vice versa. You could walk across the whole island in about 8 to 10 minutes, and around the whole island’s edge in about 45 minutes.

To get to Maldives, you typically pass through of one of the larger airports in the region, such as Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. That’s where MH370 originated on its flight to China. Kuala Lumpur is just under 2,000 miles from Maldives’ capital city, Malé.

Going against Maldives as a spot to hide a 777, it only has a couple of runways on which such a large airliner can land, and one of those is in the capital city, Malé. If that’s the runway that the MH370 pilot used in his simulator, rule it out. He isn’t going to land there without attracting notice. Malé is the kind of place where the presidential palace is surrounded by armed guards, who also patrol the streets and make themselves and their AKs very visible. If the pilot used the other runway, which is in the northern end of the island string, well, there might be something.

The aircraft would have been detected by ATC at about 125 miles if the aircraft is flying at 10,000'. He could have quickly dropped below the radar horizon which ATC could have interpreted as a ghost return and forgotten about. The aircraft then gets spotted at low level as it approaches the field at the north end of the Island. Nobody says anything until several days later when FLT 370 becomes a story. FLT 370 had the range to get the Maldives even at fairly low altitudes.

There is a problem though. Who services the aircraft at the remote field? Is there a commando team that took over the airfield and wiped out anybody in the vicinity? I am sure that if the field can support heavies then it is not an uncontrolled field and there is someone in the control tower and on the ground who would report back that FLT 370 bound for Beijing just showed up.

An afterthought about the Iranians on board; just because they are using false passports doesn't automatically make them terrorists. They could be Iranian intelligence service and traveling covertly on false passports.

I don't buy the pilot committing suicide scenario for one moment. These two pilots in my opinion were MINO's (Muslims in name only). My conclusion is based on the few pictures that appeared on a few sites a couple of days ago that showed both of them grinning from ear to ear as they showed two gorgeous young women around the "cockpit" These guys look like they were too busy enjoying the perks that come with the job to the maximum extent possible. I don't think the thoughts of 72 cloth sack encased virgins can compete with a couple of thong sporting western blonds.

I doubt your doubt. I've been to Saudi Arabia, land of the supposedly devout Muslim. They drink, they screw around, they blaspheme. Then they go to prayer. Ever wondered why Bahrain is so liberal and Saudi Arabia isn't? Bahrain is where the Saudis keep their money and party.

One more for the conspiracy club: imagine that Israel wanted to blow up the Iranian nuclear project for good. If they do it via military force the whole world goes up in flames. Too hot. But what if a group of renegade Iranians using fake passports hijack a plane and use it to deliver a crude atomic bomb? Certainly that would look like an "internal Iranian affair" and whoever financed and inspired the move would have clean hands. Just another theory.

Why not just buy an airliner that's in preservation in the US southwest. Tons of those, easy to purchase. That's the hole I see in the theory of use of the airliner as a weapon by loading it, vice doing the 911 suicide crash. It would be far easier to buy an airliner under any number of cover stories, fly it to where-ever you want to work on/load. No one would notice or be aware until using it to attack. Just another used airliner changing hands, either between airlines or to a private party. Much different than all the attention of a hijacked plane and its passengers.

I like this one. Makes more sense than some of the other theories that have been bandied about plus likeable because of the much needed and pleasant outcome for the world locally and at large. But does anybody really think a rogue plane will get very far past the air defenses of the more than paranoid Iranians? I don't

The Maldives would be well inside the range of fuel loaded for a trip to the China destination, as it was 6 hrs flight to China, and about 4 hrs to the Maldives. So even with the "low" flying (which uses more fuel) the Maldives would be in range. There is also the possibility that the landing strips on his personal "flight simulator" were decoys, meant to confuse the investigators.

My daughter and her husband are surf guides in Maldieves and have been so for about a decade. I have written to them about this and am awaiting a response. If there's anything remotely to it I'll post a comment about it.

I'm sticking with the route to the northwest and well into somewhere inside Bangladesh, another Muslim country. Used to be East Pakistan. No doubt friendly Muslim radar station controllers and tech operators there. Meet up with Muslim terrorists planning an airborne disaster just about anywhere within that Boeing's range.

There's probably an old British military base there somewhere which could at least handle an abrupt rough landing, then bus the passengers off to some sort of quonset hut holding area; then maybe even a takeoff after some sort of re-fitting with the interior passenger fittings removed saving a lot of weight. Passengers held for ransom.

John leCarre......call your office. You can't make this stuff up........can you?

I'm with you Tommy. Maybe the pilot was advised by ATC to fly "north to south-east" and the poor guy became completely disoriented while trying figure out how to comply. In fact, I understand that in the last transmission from the 777 the pilot was heard shouting "how in the hell do you fly north to southeast?". Maybe the stress simply pushed him over the edge.

Well, I think the pilot snuffed the copilot and did a suicide trip for multiple reasons: midlife crisis, the wife and kids left, he couldn't be a happy pilot forever so why not go for the gusto and 72 virgins waiting in heaven. Maybe he figured he'd get bonus virgins for a loaded plane of infidels.

Well,this was clearly very well planned beforehand and very smoothly executed....getting off radar,wave hopping,getting if down before anybody knew what happened...a very slick piece of flying.,...whoever went to all that trouble didn't do so just to dump that bird in the drink